The world of Sven Väth

by Nadia Arboit

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Cocoon, with its beauty and madness, is the creation of Sven Väth, icon and animal of the stage. Techno is his language, the turntable his medium of communication. Few other people have succeeded like him in taking their music beyond the limits of musical style and opening it up to the public in a way that’s both profound and engaging. The magic started in the 80s, when this German DJ with a passion for vinyl revolutionised the Frankfurt music scene, launching a new style of music in clubs like Vogue with influences ranging from Anglo-American underground to acid house. The 90s were decisive for his future. One evening in 1994, Sven went to the Templedrom in Berlin for a Fura dels Baus performance: it changed his life. As he saw cocoons of water (from which human bodies emerged) descending from the ceiling, he realised that the only constant in life is metamorphosis: continual change.

Inspired by this, in 1996 he turned into reality his vision of bringing together all the different sides of music. Today, after years of transformation, the brand Cocoon is involved in many projects, all of which are being personally taken forward by Sven himself. As well as the booking agency, which deals with important artists like Villalobos and Cassi, and the management of one of the most important electronic music labels in the whole of Germany since the turn of the new millennium, Cocoon is involved in many sophisticated projects. One of these is Green&Blu. This festival, one of the first projects Sven designed for the public at large, is unique: club music played outdoors in a swimming-pool. Green symbolises the earth and blue the water – two essential, mutually interdependent elements, just like music and people. This has been followed by many international projects which always emphasise some unique feature of the country they take place in. One example was Cocoon in the Mountains, a special event set against the breathtaking backdrop of the Austrian Alps with sets that highlighted the country’s beauty. Sven has always wanted to be part of international avant-garde and he has been personally involved in reinventing the format for his parties, starting from the choice of dancers. Over the years, the performances have been transformed into real works of art.

One initiative that Sven is particularly proud of is the Cocoon Club in Frankfurt, which features invited guests from a huge range of musical styles, in particular jazz and classical music. His latest project is Cocoon Ibiza, one of the landmark parties, especially on the Balearic island. It was Sven who personally chose the island as Cocoon’s summer residence. It has a mystical vein that underlines the equally dark, deep melodies he plays. 2009 was a crucial year in Sven Väth’s career. He won the prize for best Ibiza DJ and the prize for best set of the summer. In the same year, Sven and his colleagues decided to celebrate Cocoon’s tenth anniversary at Ibiza’s Amnesia. Last season, the focus was most of all on the people behind the scenes, the party heroes – after Party Animals, Cocoon Heroes were put centre-stage in 2011. With this mark of his gratitude, Sven wanted to underline that without this strong support, the world of Cocoon could not have evolved in what it’s become: a collective celebration of electronic music as a form of communication.